Advances in computer and telecommunication technology have led to wide spread adoption of mobile client devices, from the basic wireless telephones to function rich notebook sized computers that pack the power of a desktop computer. In between are web enabled wireless telephones, palm sized personal digital assistants (PDA) and so forth. As a result, multi-media contents are also becoming available and consumed through mobile client devices.
These multi-media contents include but are not limited to, movies, music, and so forth. An important aspect of utilization of multi-media contents is audio. For example, a mobile client device may include a multi-media resource such as an MP3 player or a radio (where rendering of the audio content often accompanied by displays of titles, stations, graphics and other visualizations of the like).
Utilization of multi-media resources such as MP3 player/radio requires utilization of the mobile client device's audio system, which is often a resource shared by many functions of the mobile client device. These audio system sharing functions include but are not limited to functions for delivering message alerts for the arrival of an incoming call, a text message and so forth. Thus, utilization of the audio system by the multi-media resources may cause interference and/or conflict with other resources/functions of the mobile client device.
For example, in the case of the mobile client device being a cell phone having multi-media resource capabilities, such as the MP3 player/radio, the playing of the music may interfere with the delivery of a message alert for an incoming call and vice versa. That is, the alert tone may be generated at a predetermined power level that was pre-selected by a user. However, when the MP3 player is being utilized, the pre-selected power level of the alert tone may be either too low or too high relative to the music being played, thereby causing either the alert tone being too low to be heard over the music or too high that it causes intrusive interference with the enjoyment of the music. What is worse is if the message alert is set to be delivered at a high volume to ensure that the user can hear it even in a noisy environment, and the user is employing a headset to enjoy the audio content. Delivery of the message alert at the preset high volume level may cause damage to the user's eardrum.
Among the modern mobile client devices, unquestionably, wireless mobile and palm sized computing devices have emerged as the two most popular mobile client devices to utilize these multi-media resources. Thus, a need exists for a more context sensitive way of notifying a user of an alert tone while an audio system is being utilized by multi-media resources.